


the garden of earthly delights

by creampuffs



Category: Killing Eve (TV 2018)
Genre: Dreams and Nightmares, F/F, Fever Dreams, Graphic Description
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-03
Updated: 2019-06-03
Packaged: 2020-04-07 01:16:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,802
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19074517
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/creampuffs/pseuds/creampuffs
Summary: What could be more true, more terrifying, than the thoughts you hold alone in the dark? A series of fever dreams as Eve treads the thin line between life and death. (post S2x08)





	the garden of earthly delights

You are standing in a field of tall grass and foliage.  
  
The sky is crystal blue, hyper-saturated and peppered with clouds. They hang high above you, pure white and deceptively solid-looking, as if you could pluck and crush them in your hands like sweet meringue. You are barefoot, and the soil beneath your toes is cool and damp. The weight of your body sinks into the earth, and briefly, you imagine what it would feel like to be swallowed whole, smothered by blankets of dirt. Blades of grass brush your knees as the wind blows, causing ripples in the greenery. Your hair curls around your cheeks, loose and free.    
  
It is lush and verdant and inexplicably beautiful.  
  
"It's not Alaska, but it's not bad, no?"  
  
A hand grabs you by the wrist and turns you around. The bright colors of the field swirl together, and Villanelle's dark eyes peer into yours. You stare back, your mind moving like a slow, dumb thing. Her pupils are dilated, blown wide open, and in the hypnotic grip of her gaze, you remember: the flapping of wings, the broken cry of a gunshot, and the plume of blood that unfurled from split skin, staining your sweater a deep maroon.  
  
Her fingers trace your arm, leaving a path of goosebumps. She smiles, baring too many teeth. "You're not mad at me, are you?" Her nails dig and scrape up the curve of your elbow. "If anything, I should be the one who's mad," she steps forward, closing the space between you and wrapping you in the smell of overripe fruit.  
  
Her face is mere inches from yours, and the sharpness of the fermented scent makes your eyes water. "After all, I did everything you asked..." her lips, an unnatural shade of puce, glisten as she wets them. "...I even played by your rules, mostly." It's said with a note of amusement, but the lilt makes you nervous and the sheen of her eyes puts you on edge. "All you had to do was follow me, and I would have taken care of everything."  
  
Her hand lands on your hip, and the touch is heavy as it slips under fabric and skates towards your navel. You look down to see that it's drenched in blood, and stare as she smears the shape of a candy red heart onto your bare stomach. "Eve, don't you ever get tired of pretending to be something you're not?"  
  
She tugs your shirt further up, revealing the open wound in your abdomen. Her face dips closer and your knees lock when her slick fingers creep towards shredded skin. She laughs, soft and honeyed, breath hot on your face. "Let's see what's inside. Open up." Her fingers plunge inside and you finally scream, you scream so loud you tear the sky and gouge the earth, you scream so loud you lose feeling in your face and taste only the acrid burn of your lungs. You scream as if the sound had been trapped for years, you scream like a pure and raw thing. You scream over the sound of her laughing, manic but blissful, you scream and you scream until it rains blood, sweet bile, and dark, rotten fruit from above.

  
  
Your face is slick, your hair is wet. You are half-submerged and standing, liquid lapping around the curve of your breasts. It is too thick to be water, too heavy, too dark, too coagulated. It clings to your arms and leaves dirty streaks, printed and washed anew with each movement you make.  
  
There is nothing around you, only black, only liquid. Your feet are resting on what feels like sand, but when you look down, there is not enough light to penetrate the surface, there is no way of knowing what lies beneath.  
  
Suddenly, arms wrap around you from behind. The heat of a body presses near, and the liquid around you splinters, throwing cracks across the murky surface. Hands weave together to rest on your stomach and there is no need to turn around to see who it is.  
  
"That wasn't so bad, was it?" Her voice is too close, and you shut your eyes when you feel a tongue brush against the outer shell of your ear. She sucks at your earlobe and dips down towards the curve of your jaw. You want to say something or make a noise, but nothing is working as it should and you are trapped inside your body. She presses a kiss, firm and wet, against the column of your throat and a slow pulse thrums behind your eyelids. You push against her, twisting to escape. She laughs again, louder this time, and the fractured noise bounces against the walls of your brain. Her grip tightens. You have barely moved from her embrace despite all your struggles, and only now do you notice how the liquid around you has risen to shoulder-height.  
  
"You shouldn't deny yourself the things you want. It's not very healthy."  
  
You feel her slip into the curve of your back as if it were built to hold her shape. The liquid is higher now, lapping at your chin, and panic swells. "He made a good sound when he died. The blood in his throat bubbled like water in a hot tub. It was fun, wasn't it? Like a mini jacuzzi," You hear a broken noise and realize it is you, caught between a laugh and a shriek. Your breath is ragged and you are afraid and hysterical, possibly on the brink of embodying every emotion at once.  
  
The liquid creeps up to your mouth and you gasp, inhaling it, delirious with fear. She grabs your chin and pulls you in for a brutal, open-mouthed kiss. You are enveloped, you are sunken, you are wrapped in her blinding heat. She breaks apart to speak, voice secret and serious as the black encroaches, "Don't forget," she catches your lip with her teeth and bites to draw blood, "I am the only one who knows." She presses into you as the liquid finally swallows you both, and the weight of her crushed so completely against you is exquisite. She sinks into your bones and turns you into a shroud of a human, a stone in the sea. The inside of her mouth tastes of copper and ash, and in that small dark cavern you unfold, molting as she slips inside, filling you with heat.  
  
The two of you sink, a writhing mass of limbs dropping into the depths. You are transfixed by her crooked smile, a jagged curve on the smooth unblemished surface of her face. She runs a thumb over your mouth and slips it past your lips. You suck hard and instinctively, wanting to steal her cartographic imprint even as the bitter taste of blood intensifies and pools around your gums. Hair swirls around you, heavy like seaweed, and almost blocks you from reading her lips when she mouths, "I am the only one who sees you for what you are."  
  
She leans in and smiles into your cheek, burrowing like a parasite hungry for skin, mind, and soul. You feel her claw her way inside, making skinny ribbons of your flesh as she hollows you out. Petals of blood burst as she makes a home in the cavity of your chest, and you realize she is right where she belongs.

  
  
Your mouth holds a soft and tender flesh. The flavor of it coats the roof of your mouth: sweet, rich, and heavy.  
  
You bite down and it gushes, dribbling down your chin. An appreciative hum comes from above, and you open your eyes to see Villanelle straddling you, her hands and teeth stained magenta. "You were hungry. Here, have another," she lifts another morsel to your lips and you open obligingly, suddenly parched and famished. The second bite is just as good as the first, and when you chew and swallow, you can feel the torn pieces slither down your throat.  
  
"That's right, you are a growing girl, aren't you Eve?" Her hands brush through the mess of your hair and you lean into the touch, feeling sluggish and sedated. Nails scrape against the sensitive skin of your scalp and you hiss as she suddenly yanks your hair, pulling you up. "You are a hungry caterpillar, eating everything you see," White spots of pain dance across your eyes as she yanks again and shoves another piece into your mouth. "And I for one, cannot wait to see what you are going to be like when you're—" she cuts herself off to wrap both hands around your throat, "—all grown up." You thrash wildly as she squeezes and lifts you by your neck. Confusion makes way for terror when your eyes snap up to reveal that it is not Villanelle who is crushing your throat, but it is _you_ , or a simulacra of you. Grinning wild and crazed, you are wearing an expression both horrifying and free. So blessedly free. Your vision begins to fade, but before it does, you see your face collapse and morph through a grotesque sludge of features until it rests again on Villanelle's familiar visage. She tightens her double-handed grip on your throat, crushing whatever breath you have left.  
  
"Sorry baby, this will only take a minute."  
  
The snap of your neck is comically loud, and you rattle out a final breath as she drops you to the ground.

 

   
You are laying on cool grass, wrapped in the light of a bitten moon.  
  
You turn to your left and see Villanelle laying and smiling beside you, face bloody and bruised.  
  
"Eve Polastri. You are too clever to not know how this ends." She reaches out to touch the side of your face, and you can feel the thread count of her expensive sheets back in Paris. "There is only one way forward for you—" she leans in again, this time with no knife hidden in your hands, "—and it is not without me."

In the distance, you hear discombobulated voices and an incessant, mechanical wail growing in volume. You cover her hand with your own, and the field around you crackles with fire. Smoke rises and her huge eyes stare into yours, never breaking gaze. You watch the shape of her mouth as she mutters a soft, plaintive, final message, a familiar set of words.

"You're mine."

Flames lick your toes, and the light of the moon floods the field with a harsh, incandescent white. You shut your eyes to the brightness and feel the ground beneath you bottom out. You curl closer, inhaling gunpowder and spilt champagne. She strokes your cheek, and the shape of your bodies in the burning ravine form a closed circle in the grass, an ouroboros, a starving viper in the dark.


End file.
